On March 14, Dukes sent a single up the middle in the sixth inning against Oklahoma. He has not stopped hitting since, an incredible run of consistency that has helped carry the Tigers to the West division title and the favorite to win the Southwestern Athletic Conference tournament, where they open against Alcorn State on Wednesday in New Orleans.

Dukes is hitting .394 from the leadoff spot and has produced a hit in 46 of TSU’s 49 games, earning him SWAC Player and Hitter of the Year honors. His 84 hits are the most in school history and third-most nationally.

During the streak, Dukes is hitting .430. He has 19 multi-hit games, including 11 with three or more. He went on a tear in late April, going 10-for-19 with 11 RBIs as TSU scored 62 runs in a three-game sweep at Prairie View A&M. His damage at the plate is not reserved just for the SWAC; he has multi-hit games against OU, Mississippi State and Texas.

“I try not to think about the streak,” Dukes said. “When I started kind of struggling a little bit in the middle of it, I was thinking ‘Man I need to keep it going,” Dukes said. “The team tells me to calm down. The past few games I’ve just tried to play and have fun.”

As the streak reached 30 games, Dukes said he began pressing, including a three-strikeout performance at Tulane.

“It was in my head a lot,” Dukes said. “I was swinging at everything. Curveballs in the dirt. Fastballs above my head.”

Some late-inning magic — and a little luck — has been needed at times to keep the streak alive.

Dukes had to wait until the sixth inning for a single against Grambling State in a game shortened to seven innings by run rule. He need an eighth-inning home run against Arkansas-Pine Bluff to extend the streak to 29 games.

On May 2 at Texas A&M-Corpus Christi, Dukes was 0-for-4 entering the top of the ninth inning. Even worse, he was due up fourth in the inning, meaning a teammate would need to reach base to even get a shot to extend the streak.

On the first pitch, Olajide Oloruntimilehin took a 90-something mile per hour fastball to the helmet.

“Any way to get on base,” Oloruntimilehin said with a smile. “(But) dang that hurt.”

Later in the inning, Dukes stepped to the plate with two outs. He noticed the third baseman playing deep in the infield.

“I didn’t want to do it,” Dukes said. “I feel like it’s bush league.”

After fouling off the first pitch, Dukes heard teammate Ricky Urbano from the dugout say the left side of the infield was ripe for a bunt. Dukes reached base, pushing the streak to 31 games and igniting a four-run comeback that fell short 7-5.

“In my head I really didn’t want to do it,” he said. “It literally rolled on top of the line the whole way down.”

Nine weeks since it began, Dukes said he would not be disappointed if the streak comes to an end.

“If it ends at this point, I really wouldn’t be that mad,” he said. “It might be a blessing in disguise because it would be something off my mind. I could go back to having fun.”

After hitting .292 as a junior, Dukes said he has spent more time on “the mental side,” this season studying pitching matchups and tendencies before every game.

“This year, I’ve really been studying scouting reports and what the pitcher throws in what situations,” said Dukes, a career .334 hitter.

Hip injury can't derail Dukes

TSU coach Michael Robertson calls Dukes a “feel-good story,” a path from a hip injury his senior season at Pearland that threatened to end his career to little recruiting interest to a walk-on at TSU.

Dukes played sparingly as a true freshman — “Coach Rob didn’t think I was tough enough,” he said — and got his big break when Robertson was ejected from a game late in the season. A former TSU assistant inserted Dukes into the game as a pinch-hitter — and he delivered with a bases-clearing triple.

“He’s been in the lineup ever since,” Robertson said. “We put him on scholarship his sophomore year. He’s gotten a raise every year.”

Attention sheds light on TSU

If the streak has done anything, Dukes said, it’s brought attention to a TSU baseball program vying for a third trip in four years to the NCAA Tournament under Robertson.

“It feels good to bring attention to TSU,” Dukes said as he sat on wooden bleachers at the team’s off-campus ballpark at MacGregor Park. “TSU gets overlooked a lot. Just look at our field. It’s a community park.

Joseph Duarte has been a sports reporter for the Houston Chronicle since August 1996. He currently covers college athletics, focusing on the University of Houston. Previously, he wrote about the Houston Astros from 1998-2002, Houston Texans from 2002-05 and the Texas Longhorns from 2005-09. He came to the Houston Chronicle as part of an internship through the Sports Journalism Institute in 1995.